Jodi didn’t have to think about it twice. “Neither. Can’t we just let the pieces speak for themselves?”

Lucia just shook her head in disbelief. “You are not a shy person. Why are you so uncomfortable with this?”

“It’s not about being shy,” Jodi attempted to clarify. “I much rather speak one on one with each guest. Speeches seem pompous and self-aggrandizing.”

“I’m sorry you are not comfortable with it, but it’s how things are done in this business,” Lucia said. She looked up from her notes before saying, “So, get over it and get that speech done! Now, about the final guest list…”

“Didn’t we run over the names last Friday?” Jodi argued. She was sure that they had read over the list on their last meeting, and that the final guest list had already been approved.

“We did,” Lucia answered. “But I was wondering if you had any last minute additions.”

Jodi turned her attention to her friend and interpreter, who had been leaning against a massive bookcase the entire time. “Do you want that new guy you are seeing to come?”

“Would I be working all night?” Tom asked in return.

Jodi looked at him with a sympathetic expression on her face. She wished he could be at the event as her friend, but the truth was that Tom was the best interpreter she had worked with. One thing was to be surrounded by a dozen hearing people… another thing entirely was to be with 300. “I think so,” she finally replied.

“Then no,” Tom decided, shrugging his shoulders in a “don’t-worry-nothing-to-be-done” gesture. “I’d be too tempted to disappear every half hour…”

Lucia then looked up from her notepad to ask, “What about you, Jodi? Are you bringing a date?” The artist had to admit that she found the change in the curator’s facial expression curious, and couldn’t help but wonder what was behind such a question.

Jodi had actually thought about bring a date to the opening.

There was Jennifer, the talented painter. They shared many things: the experience of being deaf, the blinding passion for art, and their love of carnal pleasures. But Jennifer was also the definition of high-strung and high maintenance. To “date” her was out of the question. She certainly didn’t mind being Jen’s booty-call, but she wasn’t about to invite her to the opening and risk a public rant about whatever Jen’s cause-celeb this week was.